


Life is to be Savored

by darthneko



Series: What Matters Most [11]
Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Forget Video Game Mechanics, Headcanon, I have no regrets, M/M, Mists of Pandaria, Mpreg, Multi, Not Canon Compliant, OT3, Pandaria is not for the weak of heart, Polyamory, So much headcanon, What Happens in Pandaria Didn't Stay There, World of Warcraft: Legion Spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2018-01-26
Packaged: 2018-09-19 13:01:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9441380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darthneko/pseuds/darthneko
Summary: ** THE CHAPTERS OF THIS FIC HAVE BEEN BROKEN OUT INTO INDIVIDUAL FICS IN THE SERIES **DUPLICATE -- Preserved for comments only





	1. Fate of the Queen’s Reprisal

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be snippets, scenes, and drabbles - things inspired from events in game, or during RP logs. I'm not going to try to put them in order, and some day I hope to be able to string them all together properly into one epic fic that details the events of Legion as seen through my headcanon, but in the meantime hopefully you can enjoy the glimpses along the way.
> 
> SPOILERS - if you care - for this series as a whole! There's some BIG plot gaps between the other fics and the bits I'm putting here. I'll fill them in eventually, but in the meantime there's some big spoilers.

The Worgen’s eyes were bright and Ren imagined the heavy plate helm on his head must be uncomfortable if his ears were trying to prick up the way a Pandaren’s would have been. “This might be the most significant intel of this campaign,” he said gruffly, but his claws here careful as he almost reverently flipped through the water stained pages of the captain’s log that Ren and his cousin had fished out of the wreckage of a Forsaken ship. 

Those bright eyes turned sharper, narrowing, as the lieutenant glanced at Ren, taking in worn, stained armor and the tired figure of a Pandaren. His nostrils twitched for a moment, but he only shook his head. “Well done, monk,” he said gruffly. “I will see to it personally that this gets into Lord Greymane’s hands. No one else needs to know of it, you understand?”

Ren, highly aware of the surrounding guards who were, one and all, Worgen from Genn Greymane’s personal corps, pasted his best serene expression on, pressed his hands together, and bowed smoothly. Satisfied, Lieutenant Surtees dismissed him with a grunt and Ren turned to leave, the hackles along his back itching until he was well quit of the interior of the enclave. His cousin was waiting for him in the outer portal room, where the blue Alliance flags were still draped in mourning black; Hardwire took one look and didn’t comment as he fell into step beside Ren, following him back out into the streets. 

Ren didn’t stop until they were a block away, the usual bustle of Dalaran’s citizens and proliferate street vendors washing away sound and sight of the Worgen stationed outside of the Alliance enclave. “Well?” Hardwire demanded.

“He’s never served in the Palace.” Ren sighed, scratching absently at one of his cheek braids where salt was drying into his fur. “None of them have. I didn’t recognize their scents, and none of them recognized mine.” He glanced down at himself distastefully, shaking one foot that had sand and a bit of some sea plant caught beneath his claws. “Granted, I need a bath, but it’s not _that_ bad.” He grinned at his cousin. “He had no idea he was telling the King’s consort that he intends to keep the intel for Greymane only.”

Hardwire snorted, patting one of the satchels at his belt. “And no idea it wasn’t the original?”

“Not a bit,” Ren said, and if he was slightly smug about it, well, it had been a suitable test of his scribing skills to duplicate the Forsaken text in the deceased ship captain’s tight, scratched handwriting. Compared to that, the binding and purposeful distressing of the book had been simple. Master Cho would doubtless be pleased to hear his copying talents hadn’t gone to waste. “Nor that the locations might not be… quite correct.” He shrugged, shaking his head in a show of mock bafflement. “The captain’s handwriting was quite bad, and that gutterspeak they use is hardly a real language.”

Hardwire chuckled, his grin all sharp teeth, and patted Ren consolingly on the shoulder. “You did your best, I’m sure.” The grin slipped away to a slight frown. “That’s your part done. Get some rest.”

Ren nodded without complaint, knowing his cousin could see his exhaustion. The rest of Dalaran, looking at them, might see only two Pandaren monks in the typical hodgepodge of gear that most mercenaries wore, but he knew Hardwire could see how loose some of the armor still fit him and the way Ren had wrapped padding beneath his breastplate to make up the difference and keep it from chafing. He was sure it showed in his face, even if his hood hid the lowered position of his ears. He was holding his own, fearless with his cousin at his back, but he was still more tired than he would have liked for such a short excursion. “I’ll go pay up our tab with the Blood Elves,” he told Hardwire. “Their food and their beds are better.”

“And their company,” Hardwire muttered, glancing back to where a pair of off-duty Worgen guards were disappearing into the human run inn behind them. He scowled at his cousin. “Make sure you eat something _before_ you sleep. We’re running it off of you as fast as you put it on.”

“I will,” Ren promised. He glanced at the satchel that contained the original log book they had found. “You’re headed back to the Shrine?”

“Yes,” Hardwire said promptly, which meant he was actually probably headed to the Exodar, then to a meandering trip through several flight paths around Kalimdor before he would find a work-for-hire mage to create a portal to Ironforge and eventually emerging back into Stormwind via the tram system. Ren just nodded and Hardwire huffed. “Anything you want to send to our mate?”

Ren grinned and hooked a claw in his cousin’s collar, tugging him in for a brief kiss, then a longer one. “One for him and one for you,” he told Hardwire, scratching briefly along his cousin’s tangled beard. “I’ll expect you back tomorrow?”

“Unless something happens,” Hardwire confirmed, nuzzling him. “Don’t wait up.”

“I’ll save you some of those pastries they make for breakfast,” Ren promised, and waved his cousin off, turning with a little more energy towards the Legerdemain Lounge and the hoped for promise of a hot bath.


	2. The Call of the Scarab

Anduin barely glanced up as General Anderson climbed the dais beside him. The man’s steps were brisk but not urgent, his posture relaxed, and nothing about the way he had entered through the side doors of the throne room and approached set off warning bells. It was an affectation, Anduin knew - Anderson could go from relaxed to deadly in a heartbeat, with barely a change of expression, but the large man took care to communicate to his liege as clearly as he could and it was a consideration in the current atmosphere that Anduin appreciated. 

It made it easy to turn his head slightly as Anderson leaned down against the arm of the throne and for all his size the other man could keep his voice low when he wanted to. “The Consort and his guard have returned, Your Majesty.”

Something unconsciously tight in Anduin’s stomach relaxed, letting his breath come easier. He hadn’t, he told himself firmly, been worried - not really, not when Ren and Hardwire had gone out together and he knew very well that they were a force to be reckoned with, especially when combined, and would always have each other's backs. It wasn’t worry for them, not as such, but it was a relief all the same to hear that they had returned, something that eased an itch somewhere beneath his ribs. It was, he could admit, purely personal, his own back and sides too empty in the absence of the presence he had grown used to. 

The audience was nearly concluded, a trade dispute that he had already made his mind up on though Anduin had been willing to let the evidence prove him wrong. It hadn’t, and his verdict didn’t make the noble houses happy but it did please the labor guilds and with seven new ships in the docks in various states of construction the guilds were, by far, the more important. Anduin wrapped the matter quickly, Anderson waiting to the side in an easy parade rest as though he might stand there all day like any common guard, but when Anduin rose to his feet the other man dropped into step beside him. 

“They should be coming in to land in the courtyard,” Anderson said mildly, and that was another reason - besides a sharp tactical mind and an astounding amount of common sense - that he had quickly risen into the ranks of Anduin’s preferred counsel. There were still, over a year and a half and four children later, those in the nobility and military who had no idea how to handle their king’s choice in consort. It ranged from stilted to hesitant to a grating kind of distance that bordered on outright distaste, and it made those like Anderson, who had never so much as blinked an eye, all the higher in Anduin’s esteem. 

Anderson, catching his king’s gaze, grinned slightly, the thick bars of his auburn moustache - tinged at the edges with silver, the only real betrayal of age in a man who had the solid height and muscle of a draft horse - twitching. "Patrol reports the Consort and company are in high spirits." 

Anduin let himself shake his head, his own smile small by habit, but real. The Call of the Scarab was an unofficial thing, an anniversary observed primarily by southern Kalimdor. It was an ostentatious name for what amounted to a friendly sort of free-for-all for the mercenaries of Azeroth in some grand re-enactment of a historic battle, coupled with routing the cultists who persisted in being deeply entrenched in the empty dunes of the Silithus desert where camps could pull up stakes and disappear without a trace in a matter of hours. The Cenarion Circle who watched over the legitimate routes through the desert did what they could, but the cultists seemed to grow at the same rate as the great sprawling Silithid hives that dotted the inhospitable landscape.

In the end, the Call did double duty of culling the dangers of the region while masquerading as a holiday of sorts. Anduin had already heard more than enough objections to it all, but in the end he had overridden them; overridden, and granted leave to every mercenary contracted to the Alliance, as well as every standard militia not currently involved in the fleet rebuilding effort. It was, he had pointed out, only three days. It gave the restless something to do, shored up morale and injected patriotism in the military, and was a much needed economic boost to southern Kalimdor. The re-enactment war games, he had argued, where Alliance soldiers clashed with Horde during the day and then retreated to Gadgetzan and temporary camps at night to drink and mingle with those same Horde soldiers and compare their 'kill' counts, fostered an interfactional camaraderie that Azeroth as a whole desperately needed. 

It was, in short, a three day grant of leave, where the off-duty drunken brawlers could go brawl somewhere _else._

The fact that "mercenary" and "drunken brawler" could previously have been used to describe the royal Consort was a fact that most people - including Anduin - sometimes forgot. He had been well prepared to lose one mate for the duration and not as well prepared to lose both, but he'd given in to the inevitable with as much grace as he could muster. Now, knowing they were both returning safely, he could even enjoy it, a vicarious pleasure in the fun his mates had undoubtedly had while out causing chaos and sanctioned destruction.

He could, Anduin thought, be forgiven if his steps quickened through the halls which led to the north facing courtyard that overlooked the lake. Anticipation was a warm feeling in his veins and his smile, confined to the small polite expression he used in public, broke free to something broader and more real as he caught sight of a tangle of multicolored scales through the archways that surrounded the courtyard, where two cloud serpents were looping over and around each other and Hardwire's deep laugh was echoing from something Ren had said.

Anduin started to take the shallow steps down into the promenade that encircled the courtyard... and stopped, caught short as one of the cloud serpents reared up, launching itself skyward, and he had his first good look at the two Pandaren who shared his life.

They were both wearing identical outfits, not the normal warm browns of Hardwire's traveling clothes or the rich tones Ren favored. They were ruffled from the flight and still sandy around the edges, and their clothes were... Anduin had to think hard for a moment before placing the purple and red robes as something used by the cultists and how his _mates_ had ended up wearing Twilight Cult robes was a question he didn't want to examine too closely.

Assuming they could even be called _robes._

Oh, it was a perfectly standard kilt from the waist down, the kind of light cloth mageweave favored by spellcasters the world over if one ignored the excessive amount of leather-belted trim. The outfit's resemblance to the full body garments used by many mages and priests ended there, though, and from the waist up there was more buckled leather, some strategically placed cloth, and _entirely too much bare FUR._

Anduin's complexion had been inherited more from his fair haired mother than his father's easily tanned swarthiness. It was a liability in the sun and even more so when he could feel the flush rising up his neck and through his cheeks. A disproportionate amount of blood was rushing away from his head, heat coiling abrupt and hot through his stomach, the feeling thrumming all through him in an electric jolt. 

He tore his eyes away, spine snapping straight as he drew in a sharp breath and hastily reassembled the guarded mask of his public face. It wasn't, he noted dimly, as eye-catchingly arresting on Hardwire as it was on Ren; they were, both of them, displaying the same wealth of pale fur from chest all the way down to their hips, bisected by a vertical strap that appeared to be the sole thing holding the whole outfit together. Anduin had a brief moment to realize just how ridiculous it was - he was well familiar with both of them in nothing but their fur and had seen them both in public shirtless, but there was something about the way the kilt fabric hung low on the hips, supported by the heavy leather strap that lay across chest and belly, topped by a scrap of fabric, that made the swathes of bared fur all along belly and ribs and back that much more glaringly _naked._

Hardwire wore it the same way he wore travel leathers, armor, councillor robes, and his own fur; confidently and easily, as handsome and distracting as he ever was. Ren, however... Anduin swallowed a strangled breath, trying to relieve the sudden dryness of his throat, and forced his frozen feet to continue into the courtyard.

* * * * *

"..no _idea_ what he was thinking," Ren was saying as he slid down from his serpent's saddle, ears canted back in exaggerated disbelief. "In the tents! Ran right into the middle of the tents, _away_ from all of us, you'd think he'd never worked in a group before..."

"Death knight," Hardwire said succinctly, chuckling, as though that explained everything. Which, really, Ren had to admit, it probably did. "In the tent wasn't so bad, but on _top_ of it was..."

"Where did he think he was _climbing?"_ Ren exclaimed, tugging in frustration at the braids along his chin. "What did he think he was going to do, sit up there until the elemental burned the tent down? It was on _fire!"_

Hardwire laughed, eyes scrunched up above his delighted smile, and for a moment it was like it had been for the last few days - just the two of them, Ren and Hardwire, they way they had always been. Where labels didn't matter so much and there was nothing but the love of life lived to its fullest and the most steadfast strength - of family, of heart - at his back and at his side. 

"He'd probably picked up a head injury," his cousin suggested, grin wicked. "Took a tumble when that hive colossus stomped, and it's not like worgen do long falls very well." 

Ren snorted, the sound breaking into a laugh that he only half heartedly tried to cover up. "I didn't know why they were yelling to put our backs to a wall until that poor gnome went flying..."

"Ancestors, I thought she was going to land in Un'goro!" Hardwire admitted and any hope of decorum was lost, the laughter bubbling up and out as they leaned on each other, sore and exhilarated and triumphant. The Alliance, in the end, hadn't carried away the final pennant of the games, but it hadn't mattered in the slightest to the amount of fun they had had.

Someone at the edge of the courtyard cleared their throat and Ren's ears perked up as they both turned to greet their human mate. They made, he was sure, a sight - identical outfits scavenged from the Twilight camps, indiscriminately covered in dust and the hastily brushed away remnant of wounds, and matching wicked grins, the ones their teaching masters and mothers had forever despaired of. 

Anduin... didn't look amused.

Ren felt his ears lower for real and saw, from the corner of his eye, his cousin's ear flick back, Hardwire's hand tightening against Ren's arm. They were still so much in step after days of fighting in synch with one another, chi flowing effortless between them, that the sudden bolt of tension in Ren's nerves could have come from either of them, mirrored back and forth between them. Anduin looked serious, mouth set, face grim, and there were so many things Ren could think of that might have gone wrong, an endless number of horrible possibilities that all set his heart to racing and put a cold lump in his stomach. 

Anduin strode across the grass and right up to them and all Ren could think was that something had happened, someone was hurt, the cubs, the city, the Legion, and then Anduin shouldered his way right into arm's reach and... _oh._

_OH._

His scent was thick and heady, rolling ahead of each step in a wave that settled like a blanket into Ren's nose and across his tongue. The heavy scent of musk and lust, human skin and human desire, the scent that made up one of the bases that permeated the bed they all shared. It was a warm scent, one that called up an answering heat through Ren's skin, tingling just beneath his fur, and next to him Hardwire drew in a deeper breath on a low, muted rumble. 

Anduin's face was the perfect mask of the King, serious and somber, but his scent wrapped around them and told a different story. His eyes were so dark the blue was barely a sliver, blown wide and hungry. Ren shivered and didn't even try to resist when their mate hooked two fingers into the collar of his top, dragging him down to bring Ren's ear closer. 

"For the love of Light," Anduin growled, quiet and hard as mithril, "put some _clothes_ on."

Out of sight, blocked by the angle of his body, his free hand raked blunt human nails up Ren's exposed belly and across his ribs, making Ren bite back a helpless sound. At his side Hardwire's rumble shifted into a deep purr, the half growled sound of appreciation rumbling through his chest. 

Anduin didn't turn from Ren - and only they knew what that cost him - but his hand, on the pretext of shoving with some authority at Hardwire's shoulder, hooked fingers into fur and tugged. Ren was close enough to feel the little answering shiver that it sparked in his cousin, and the way Hardwire's purr slipped even deeper in wordless delight. Satisfied, Anduin tugged Ren down a little more, close enough not to kiss but to _bite_ , blunt human teeth nipping along his jaw and making Ren shudder. 

Anduin pulled back slowly, his darkened eyes heavy with unspoken meaning, and Ren didn't need words to know his own role was to pay the gesture forward to the mate their human couldn't touch in public. "I have council," Anduin said firmly, looking pointedly at them both. "I'll see you in our quarters in one hour." It was a promise, as good as signed with the royal seal, and Ren breathed out a little shakily as Anduin turned on his heel and strode away.

"Well," Hardwire said with a smug rumble of satisfaction, his hand settling lightly on the small of Ren's back as though to steady him even as his claw tips scratched another wave of shivers through Ren's rapidly melting nerves, " _that_ was certainly worth coming back for."

* * * * * 

Anderson's curiosity lasted all of six steps into the hallway before it got the better of the man; there was a real note of concern in his voice, though, which Anduin was grateful for. "Problem, sire?"

Anduin took a breath, the usual polite excuses - _it's fine, everything's fine, it's nothing_ \- piled up on his tongue. The other man's concern was genuine, though, tinged with the actual care that, more often than not, King Anduin Wrynn found only in those older military service members who had had the training of a young Prince Anduin. Anderson hadn't - had, if Anduin remembered rightly, been stationed in Kalimdor during the years when Anduin had spent the most time with arms tutors - but the genuine feeling that seemed to see him as more than just a political figure was still there.

And perhaps, he realized, he was simply tired of pretending to all and sundry that his family - his mate, his cubs - were interchangeable with the familiar that the human nobles of Stormwind expected. It hadn't been that long since he had counseled Ren to be more himself and attempt to blend in less; it would be the height of irony if Anduin himself kept perpetuating it. 

And maybe, just _maybe_ , he was tired of being the diplomat, tired of endlessly holding his tongue when he could remember his father saying whatever came to mind without much or any regard for propriety. 

"General Anderson," he said, exhaling a breath that was easier than he had thought it would be and determinedly ignoring the embarrassed heat he could feel beneath his collar, "what would you have done if your lady wife had been delivered of four babes at once?"

"Panicked," was the prompt reply, without a trace of self consciousness or having to consider the answer. Anderson only hesitated afterwards, giving the matter a moment of actual thought, and Anduin's estimation of the man went up several notches. "And hired a wet-nurse." Another pause, his brow furrowing slightly. "Maybe several."

Anduin had to cough slightly, covering a laugh. "Understandable," he agreed. "But, you see, that number isn't that unusual for a Pandaren."

Anderson muttered something that sounded more than a bit like 'Light have mercy', quickly followed by an apologetic "your Majesty", and Anduin managed to stifle the laugh but not his smile. 

"If a race routinely has multiple births," he explained, "then surely it's not unreasonable to expect that nature would... provide." A lifetime of diplomacy meant that his voice didn't wobble in the slightest, though he could feel the flush in his cheeks as he sketched a quick, rounded motion with both hands, not at chest level but lower, against his own ribs, and then lower still, against his belly. 

Anderson's eyes widened, his mouth caught part ways open, and for one priceless moment he twisted, looking back down the corridor to the courtyard even though nothing much of it could be seen between the archways. Anduin let his hands drop once more, waiting with the ghost of a smile as the older man pieced together what had been said, what _hadn't_ been said, and what the royal Consort _hadn't_ been wearing. "Well," he managed at last, swallowing. "That's... that is..." 

"Ren is male," Anduin said dryly, taking pity on the man. "And now that the babes are weaned it's really no more noticeable than it would be for you or I."

Anderson coughed slightly, smoothing down one side of his thick moustache. "Still," he said, and bless the man, there was a hint of a grin beneath that carefully groomed hair, "I imagine that's a hard thing to forget, after all. Least ways, I'm not sure _I'd_ ever forget it if it were my wife, and that's a fact. Beg pardon, Sire."

"None needed," Anduin assured him. He felt lighter inside, and still warm, both with the heat his mates had inspired and with a bright, almost bubbling warmth that he only belatedly recognized as freedom, born of shared humor and camaraderie. "But I'm sure you'll understand, General, if this is going to be a _very_ short council session."

Anderson's bark of surprised laughter drew out Anduin's own smile, something he didn't bother suppressing again until they were at the doors to the council chamber and then it was a very close thing indeed when, catching Anderson's eye, the other man cheekily gave him a wink and a nod before going to take his place at the table. Anduin had to bite the inside of his lip to keep from breaking face, and then determinedly did not glance the other man's way as he let the minister of trade thrust a new sheaf of freshly copied parchments at him. 

Light and warm and _right_ , his mates no further away than the royal quarters, close enough to reach and touch. Anduin smiled slightly to himself, flipping rapidly through the parchment sheets. It was going to be a very short council session indeed.


	3. A Lovely Charm Bracelet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Love is in the Air comes around every year, but this will be the first for the newly crowned King of Stormwind.

"Good morning, Your Majesty," was the first warning he had, a little too bright and cheerful, the throne room guards all smiling a little too broadly. Anduin shook his head ruefully.

"Already?"

The senior guard grinned, utterly unrepentant. "It's not so bad, sir.... yet."

"Yet," Anduin echoed dubiously. His willingness to play along with the game made their smiles broader still, both guards moving to sweep back the doors to the throne with more enthusiasm than strictly necessary. 

The audience line had already formed, which didn't make it that different from most days except for the composition of the line - even at a glance Anduin could count more mercenaries than tradesmen, when usually it was the reverse. It was the throne itself that was the source of the guards' amusement; or rather, the two small wrapped boxes resting there, given place of pride on the cushion. 

Anduin plucked them from the throne. The gift boxes fit in his palm, heavier than they looked, with a metallic sort of jingle to them. "Only two?" he noted, jesting. 

"He's being very restrained," Harthford, his personal guard for the day, replied straight faced. The older man had served as a guard to Anduin's father as well, and his grin was badly hidden behind his beard. 

Anduin chuckled, slipping the boxes into the pocket of his coat and took his seat on the throne, nodding to the minister in charge of organizing the audience line to proceed. The guards thought it a joke and he would play along accordingly, but he knew precisely who the two small gift boxes had come from, and the weight of them in his pocket sparked an answering warmth in his chest - though how his mates had managed it, when he would have sworn they had been at his side all night, was a mystery perhaps best left to the monk training masters.

* * * * *

The spring festival of love was an old tradition, a time for new courtings and spring weddings or renewal of old vows. The streets of Stormwind were awash in flower and sweet vendors, doing a brisk business to young and old alike. Somewhere in the midst of the traditions for couples there had been acknowledgements of other relationships added on over the years - families exchanging gifts, apprentices leaving flowers for their craftmasters, teachers gifted with handfuls of sweets from their classes. And someone, at some point, had had the brilliant idea of making a gift to the throne, a token of appreciation - and hopefully recognition and favor - to the King.

Needless to say, that tradition had caught on like wildfire. Over time it had become a gesture rather than a deliberate attempt to curry favor - respect for the throne and the King, Anduin's father had told him once, a renewal of the oath their fighters gave to the kingdom. 

That his father had said the words through gritted teeth had been beside the point. No matter how many headaches he gave himself from clenching his jaw over the week of the festival, or the explosive rants Anduin had been party to in private, Varian Wrynn had been the model of a gracious king to the public, accepting each and every token gift with polite acknowledgement. Anduin, in turn, could do no less. 

It might, once, have been gifts of actual jewels and precious metals, meant to buy favor with the throne. If so, that time was long gone; tradition was for a handcrafted trinket and the pattern that had been struck upon was simple enough that most guardsmen and mercenaries could craft the things themselves, with varying levels of personalization. Jewelsmiths did a thriving business during the week as well, selling the supplies, extruded metal wire coils and assorted findings. The end result was a bracelet, linked plates of wire wrapped carven charms made of materials that best suited the giver - Anduin had seen them in wood and stone, though many mercenaries used bone, cleaned and dried, cut into disks and finely carved. Wrapped in brass or copper, sometimes even in silver or gold or more exotic metals, and traditionally signed with the crafter's name on one of the charms. 

The charm bracelets had, for many years, been a favorite gift among peers and friends, leaving the flowers and sweets to actual couples. It was personal without being too precious, the work that went into it the majority of the actual gift. Children made them out of bits of wood and string or ribbons, passing them freely amongst themselves. Some, made by actual jewelsmiths with precious stones set into each cast metal charm and the whole linked smoothly by gold chain, were used in lieu of rings during proposals. And every year, the throne received hundreds of them, handmade tokens of loyalty and respect. 

It was ridiculous on the face of it, but Anduin tried to take it in the spirit of the tradition - it was a reason for the men and women who willingly stood on the kingdom's front lines to have a chance to meet their king, a brief moment or two of personal recognition for their hard work. The tokens themselves were just that - tokens. It was the people involved that were the important part, and he tried to remember the name of every audience approacher who was called out, so as to thank them personally for their service. The charm bracelets themselves were a blur, his staff already well trained and prepared to whisk them away, and what was done with them Anduin honestly wasn't sure. 

The only ones of any importance to him, personally, were the ones in his pocket, gifts from his mates who had, each, carried arms for the Alliance at different points in time. That they had taken the time to carry through with the tradition when there really was no need made Anduin smile, for more reasons than one. From Ren, it was a gift of sentiment - his consort might not have chosen loyalty to the Alliance, but his loyalty to Anduin himself was unshakeable. 

From Hardwire... well, _that_ was a tradition in and of itself, and one Anduin was glad to see unbroken after all of the pain of the last months. 

Hardwire was entirely the reason his guards were grinning, waiting for the other shoe of the joke to drop - because joke it had been, a long standing one between the Pandaren monk and the elder Wrynn. Anduin, who had watched it over the years, had wondered, sometimes, how much of it was a joke and how much might be serious. One token, given to a liege lord, was right and proper. Multiple tokens, given day after day after day, was outright attention seeking, and had, in Hardwire's case, been accompanied by such blatantly outrageous flirtation that Anduin swore he could _see_ his father's blood pressure rising by the second. 

Not that the Pandaren was alone in this - Anduin had also seen others, women and men both, attempt to inject some personal feeling into the act of gift giving, which his father had always turned a blind eye and unresponsive shoulder to, treating it as no more or less than any other gift token. Hardwire's claim to fame had been the fine line between jesting and seriousness that he had effortlessly threaded, along with the sheer lengths he had been willing to go to in order to get a rise out of the elder Wrynn. 

The time Hardwire had been in Kalimdor, for instance, when Varian had heaved a sigh of relief that perhaps the festival might go smoothly for once - only to find himself receiving packages from Goblin couriers from Kalimdor multiple times a day. 

Or the time when, upon entering the throne room for morning audience, he had found the entire throne covered, every inch, in bracelets.

_That_ had resulted in one of Hardwire's temporary 'banishments' from Stormwind, wherein he usually took refuge in the Dwarven inn, the proprietor of which was only too happy to claim the building as sovereign Ironforge territory, the acknowledged embassy, and therefore not technically Stormwind at all. It had let the both of them save face until Varian's temper had exhausted itself. 

When Anduin had been younger the ongoing feud and yearly joke had been a source of amusement - a grand jest, one that let his father rant and snarl about the joke in safety, while refraining from too much overt snarling about his personal opinion of the holiday in general. After the discovery of Pandaria itself, and his own time in it, he had wondered, sometimes - if there was any thread of truth in the joke, if there was more to it than old friends and the tradition of a prank. If he and his father might not share a few things in common, and that had given him more than a few sleepless nights in the last months with questions he could in no way ask. 

_(No, Ren had assured him, having already gotten the story from Hardwire at one point. No, it hadn't been anything other than friendship, and Anduin could admit to himself that he had been greatly relieved. It had been hard enough working through to his own satisfaction his feelings for his father's friend, without it being anything infinitely more complex or worse.)_

But it wasn't Varian Wrynn who sat on the throne this holiday, and it hadn't taken the height of observation to note Hardwire's lowered ears or the way the subject had fallen to the wayside. "It won't be the same," Hardwire had admitted grudgingly. Anduin had stroked his ears, whole and ragged alike, in silent sympathy.

"Then do it for me," he had suggested, trying to tease, anything to ease the somber pain that crept in at the edges whenever Hardwire thought too hard on the events of the Broken Shore. "And unlike my father, I promise to wear it."

That had gotten him a small but genuine smile, and now there were two boxes in his pocket to be opened later, bracelets he would happily wear that evening, something for the older cubs to exclaim over and his mates to see. Anduin slipped his hand into his pocket between audiences, touching the gifts lightly, and turned with willingness to the next mercenary who approached the throne with a box in hand.

* * * * *

It was late into the audience hours when the royal Consort and his cousin unexpectedly turned up in line.

Anduin almost had to look twice when their names - sans title or any other fanfaire - were called, the surprise making him slow. They were both of them in travel clothes, leathers worn smooth and supple, ragged and stained, the sort of clothes for hunting, fishing, and sleeping out on the road. They had obviously been out somewhere; Elwynn forest, Anduin suspected, part of Hardwire's ongoing campaign to train Ren back into some semblance of fitness after the birth of the babes. There was dirt and what looked like fresh blood stains on their clothes, and there would probably be venison or roast boar on the dinner table. 

Dirty and disheveled, and Ren, at least, was visibly tired, and both with small gift boxes in hand and the most shit-eating grins Anduin had ever seen. He didn't, in that moment, know whether to kiss them or box their ears. 

Fortunately, propriety decreed that he do neither, and Anduin spent the next several minutes sympathizing with his father's gritted teeth as the two approached the dais and they wall went through the pantomime of a very proper gift and receipt to the throne. "Two?" he whispered archly, when he was accepting the box from Hardwire's hand. Ren chuckled and Hardwire grinned, all teeth and an expression Anduin was sure had provoked most of the bar fights his father and Hardwire had ever been in. 

"You're a smart cub," Hardwire said softly, laughter rumbling through his voice. "You'll figure it out."

Anduin snorted softly, taking the gift box, and only raised his voice as he stepped back. "The Alliance thanks you for your service." He let his voice soften when he looked at Ren, trying to let his voice and eyes convey what he couldn't by touch in front of an audience hall full of people. "I thank you."

They bowed, matching dips in the stately Pandaren fashion, and that was the end of the little joke. Anduin shook his head to himself as he watched them go, then had to rescue the box he was holding from the overly efficient reach of his aide. "Gifts from family I'll keep," he told the man firmly, slipping the boxes into the pocket opposite the others. 

The man blinked at him, then turned so fast he almost stumbled to blink at the retreating backs of the two Pandaren. "That was..."

"My consort, having a bit of a jest," Anduin agreed, and waved away the man's apology, directing him back to the task at hand. His guards, when he glanced at them, were grinning and still looked as though they were waiting for another part of the joke to manifest, but the rest of the audience went smoothly, as did all other duties for the day. It was only at the end of the day, having finished the last council, that Anduin remembered the the small boxes that were jingling in his pockets.

Bone and pieces of softer types of stone, carved and polished and wrapped in gold wire. Hardwire carved shapes into his - the ox, tiger, crane, and cloud serpent of the August Celestials, depicted in stylized lines where several short marks could become the graceful figure of a crane among reeds. Ren, Anduin was unsurprised to see, carved words into his, miniscule Pandaren writing carved in a steady hand, and the charms washed in blue ink with the words picked out in a glint of gold paint. He had to puzzle over the words for awhile, trying to make sense of them, and when he did it made him laugh - the charms were named, one after the other, for the pieces of the strategy game they had first played when a polite Lorewalker had been struggling to keep a bored and bed bound injured Prince from feeling too isolated. 

Four bracelets. Anduin slipped one onto each wrist, Ren's to the left and Hardwire's to the right, feeling the unfamiliar weight of them and admiring the work that had gone into them. For all the handmade roughness, they were fine enough pieces to look at, and he wondered idly if his mates might enjoy seeing them on him, one to each wrist and ankle. He had, after all, promised to wear them. 

As it turned out, his mates _did_ quite enjoy that, and Anduin was feeling very well pleased with himself the next morning when he approached the throne room...

To find another two identical boxes on the throne, in precisely the place the previous two had been the day before. 

"Very restrained," Harthford - who had opted for audience duty all that week and was obviously enjoying himself immensely - assured him. Anduin agreed mildly, slipping the boxes into his pocket.

He was, as Hardwire liked to tease him, a 'clever cub', and more than capable of doing rudimentary math as the scope of the quiet prank became clear. Four bracelets a day, an entire week of festival - the charms were not without weight and bulk and seven to each limb would easily create a solid mass from wrist to elbow, ankle to knee, if not beyond. 

And he had _promised_. 

The morning was spent with the problem circulating quietly in the back of his mind as he went through the motions - bowing, thanks, listening, judging - that made up a set of audience hours little different from the day before. When his mates arrived right on schedule towards the end of the audience, their grins even more smug than the day before, Anduin smiled serenely back at them and accepted the additional gift boxes with every outward evidence of sincere pleasure.

"Well played," he whispered to them, which made their ears prick up, suppressed laughter rumbling through Ren's chest and Hardwire's open mouthed grin of delight nearly infectious. 

The bracelets, he found afterwards, were different from the day before, Hardwire's full of fish and turtles that were recognizable despite the minimal lines, and Ren's uncolored but inscribed with a line of verse that Anduin had to turn over several times before finding the reading order of, something from the history scrolls that his mate had first tried to teach him written Pandaren from. There had been real work and thought put into them, and Anduin carefully slid them on, exactly as he had the day before, and then went to dinner with a smile. 

He took the teasing at his easy 'defeat' and 'cheat' method of wearing each bracelet only once on the day of gifting with a good nature and an easy, sheepish shrug. He hadn't counted on them pranking him, he admitted, which was true enough, but he _would_ wear each bracelet at least once - he had promised.

And they _did_ like how their handiwork looked on him, after the cubs had been put to bed and it was just the three of them, when they had worked their way through the layers of his court clothes to bracelets and skin and nothing but. That, alone, made it quite worth it in Anduin's book.

But 'defeat' was not a word that his father had ever taught him. So he smiled, and took the teasing, and each successive day's allotment of bracelets, admiring each in turn without so much as a hint of other thought anywhere to be seen. And the week continued on.

* * * * *

Twenty-eight bracelets. By the end of the week there were twenty-eight of the things, all laid neatly in a carven wood box with velvet lining that had taken up residence in a drawer in Anduin's office. His mates were, no doubt, looking forward to seeing their last efforts on him that evenings; Ren had remarked that it was a good look, and he hoped Anduin might occasionally continue wearing them after the festival.

It was the last evening of the festival, the flower and sweet sellers finally closing up shop and taking stock of their sales. The festival merchants were taking down the temporary stalls set up in the market squares. And the King of Stormwind had, through much arranging, several hours of free time without interruption, a spool of gold jewelry wire, and a set of the small tools that the festival merchants had been happily selling all week. 

The subterfuge had been the hardest part of the shuffle and he felt some small twinges of guilt for involving his eldest daughter and sons in the scheme. The cubs had been delighted, though, with the opportunity to play hide and seek with their father and uncle. It wasn't *their* fault that said father and uncle didn't know they were playing, being under the impression that they were helping SI:7 round up delinquent cubs who had escaped from their lessons. 

_"Keep 'em running around for a few hours and make sure the kids don't take any heat from it," Renzik had rattled off, chuckling. "You got it, boss." The Goblin had a sharp gaze, his grin showing a number of teeth, but Anduin had long ago learned to tell humor from threat in Renzik's expression, and for this task Mattias Shaw's second had a better head for and appreciation of pranks than Shaw did. Also less respect for Anduin's position and far more willingness to say exactly what was on his mind, which was something Anduin had grown to rely on even when Renzik's sharpness didn't spare **him** any. "Want me to tell the staff morning audience is canceled, too? Can't imagine you're going t' be up or walkin' straight by then, and if you are then Stoneclaw isn't puttin' the effort in."_

_"Push it back by two hours," Anduin had told him, and though he knew he kept his expression in check there must have been flags of color on his cheeks because Renzik laughed, thumping his fist against Anduin's hip - shoulder height to the Goblin - and wished him luck._

Luck, Anduin had quickly concluded, was going to be pulling off what he had in mind in the time allotted. Twisting the wire into shape wasn't as easy as the countless bracelets that had passed through his hands in the last week implied, smaller and more delicate to the touch than fixing the metal bits of saddle or travel gear would have been. His link twists were rough in comparison to the neat wrappings his mates had made, but they held together sufficiently, and that would have to be good enough. 

He worked quickly in order to have time to spare - time enough to retire to the royal quarters and wash up, and from that point there was only the moment of truth. Anduin left half the lamps unlit, raked back the damp strands of his hair, and set about laying the stage. 

Twenty-eight bracelets, all sized large for his wrists though they fit snuggly around his ankles. He had left the first four aside, exactly as they had been given to him, and those four went as they had the first evening, one to each limb. 

Of the twenty-four remaining, it took one and most of another to loop around his neck, the remnant of the second dangling into the hollow of his throat. The feel of it was strange; Anduin had never given much thought to jewelry outside of the family rings he habitually wore, and the charms were cool against his skin, the weight odd where it hung on his neck. 

Twenty-two after that, and it had taken a full fifteen to span the width of his hips, wire loops linking the chains in rows, one atop the other, to create a three wide belt of sorts. The charms and wire were cold to the touch against bath warmed skin, making him suck in a breath through his teeth, but warmed quickly enough after. The seven left over had been attached by one end each to the lowest links of the belt - three to the back, four to the front, the weight of them pulling the chains that spanned his hips downward, the whole of it jingling every time he moved. 

Twenty-eight bracelets and not a single stitch otherwise. It was utterly indecent and didn't hide a damned thing, skin and scars all laid bare, and the drape of the charm bracelets between the front of his thighs only highlighted how much they weren't covering.

His mates teased about his blushes but this went so far beyond that it felt like his skin was scoured raw and sensitive, aware of every brush of air, the swing and weight of the charms, and all of it sinking an expectant heat into his veins. Taking a shuddering breath, Anduin settled gingerly onto the bed, knees spread and feet tucked beneath him. He didn't glance at the looking glass on the armoire, not wanting to see - there were some things one couldn't judge for themselves, he told himself firmly, and the truth would be in his mate's eyes, not what a silvered glass told him. 

The effort and sentiment were the actual gift, after all, not the charm strung bracelets themselves. And he had promised, and the weight of twenty-eight promises made by his mates hung tantalizing against his skin, each carven charm a promise of love and devotion beneath the semblance of the prank. 

_Concentrate. Feel._ Wise words, from wise mates, and Anduin let his eyes close, listening to the less-than-steady sound of his own breaths. 

When the time came he could feel the rhythm of his heart in his skin, throbbing through his veins, his body strung tight in the slow pulse of anticipation. The sound of the door opening made his heart skip a beat and all the answer he needed was in the breathless exclamation Ren made and Hardwire's rough, growled purr of appreciation. 

Anduin opened his eyes to meet the matching hungry gazes of his mates, not trying to hide his relieved and slightly smug smile, and wordlessly spread his arms in invitation.


	4. Ringing in the New Year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Don’t wait up, you said, there won’t be any trouble." In retrospect, Anduin should have known better._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told myself this would be the start of posting a piece of art with every chapter or fic, but the end result is just that I've been sitting on this without posting for the better part of a month. So, that's one New Years resolution already down the drain, oh well! So instead, here's the fic, totally based on what the boys got up to in game on New Years eve.

“We’re just going out for drink, you said. Don’t wait up, you said, there won’t be any trouble.”

The words were meant to be as dry as the Tanaris desert, but Anduin couldn’t entirely keep the amusement out of his voice. Two sets of ears twitched upwards to hear it, his mates’ smiles shifting from the sheepish looks he had first laid eyes on to matching broad grins without a trace of repentance anywhere in them. To Anduin’s left Shaw exhaled heavily, the sound purposefully audible and thick with the man’s frustrated disgust.

“In our defense,” the Royal Consort of Stormwind offered cheekily from the wrong side of the bars of a cell in the Stockades, where Ren was sitting on a small heap of dry straw and leaned up against his cousin with as much dignity as he usually reserved for the throne room, “it’s apparently very hard to tell the difference between fur and cloth in dim lighting conditions.”

Shaw made a half strangled sound in his throat. Anduin, under cover of sweeping a disbelieving palm over his face, had to swallow hard and bite his lip to suppress his smile. 

He _should_ , by all rights, have been angry. The night before had been longer than usual - a late dinner and then they’d taken the cubs to the top of the castle tower to watch the first, smaller, firework display set off over the canals. It had been hours to put the children to sleep after that, the three oldest all but vibrating with excitement from the boom and crack of the display. Once they were all safely and finally tucked into bed Anduin had gone back to the tower with his mates and, laughing, clear up to the rooftop, all three of them sliding across the ice cold shingles to perch atop the highest point and watch the final firework show as the Cathedral chimed in the last midnight of the year. 

He’d retreated to bed sometime before the bells chimed two in the morning, and they hadn’t yet rang out the fifth hour of the new day before the head of SI:7 had roused him back out again with the news of an incident involving the Consort, his Guard, and the Stockades. Too little sleep, no food, and stumbling back out into the cold in the pre-dawn light to deal with it - no, by all rights Anduin should have been _furious_. 

Instead, there was a laugh caught up under his ribs that he struggled to swallow down, the sheer ridiculousness of the situation straining his ability to hold onto any semblance of a stern expression. Anduin held out his hand and Shaw obligingly passed over a sheet of the thick rag paper that the guard used for first draft reports and temporary memos. Anduin had already read it while he was rubbing the sleep from his eyes and struggling into a clean shirt, but he made a show of looking over it again.

“Disregarding the charges of drunk and disorderly that three fourths of Stormwind is guilty of and which I’m unanimously pardoning,” he said, casually, “there’s still the issue of unauthorized use of public property-”

“They were already using it when we got there,” Hardwire rumbled. He had his back propped up against the stone slab wall of the cell and there were bits of straw threaded through his hair and beard. 

Anduin pursed his lips for a moment until he could school his expression once more. “Also resistance to the guards-”

“They had _no_ sense of humor,” Ren interjected dryly.

“-and two counts of public indecency,” Anduin finished, folding the sheet over in neat halves with a sharp crease as he looked pointedly at his mates, both of whom were wearing nothing more than their underclothes and the fur they’d been born with.

“Lies,” Hardwire said promptly, his smug grin flashing teeth. “Everyone still had the important bits on.”

“Mostly,” Ren amended. 

Hardwire rubbed at his unscarred ear, scratching idly down his jaw to dislodge a few bits of straw from his beard as he considered that. “Mostly,” he agreed. “Did that pretty little russet fur still have her bra on?” 

“Maybe?” Ren hazarded, though he sounded far from sure. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose. “The sable furred Worgen calling out the shots didn’t - almost hit me in the face with it when she tossed it from the dais.”

Anduin bit the inside of his lip hard enough to taste a hint of blood drawn too close to the surface in the divot left behind. He could only too well imagine the look of disbelief and suffering on Mathias Shaw’s face and didn’t dare glance at the other man because if he did he would utterly lose what little composure he was clinging to. “Why,” he managed, voice a little strangled from swallowing back laughter as he extended the vowel sound into a drawn out question, “was anyone throwing their clothes anywhere?”

His mates shared a look, ears flicking too quickly to be easily read. If Anduin had ever wondered where his oldest sons’ had inherited the innocent look that bought their way out of trouble from, the evidence was sitting right in front of him, plastered all over their father and uncle as Ren and Hardwire turned back to him in synch. 

“Someone yelled ‘strip’,” Hardwire admitted, as though it were the most sensible answer in the world. “Seemed like a great idea at the time.”

“Everyone had something on below the waist,” Ren assured him reasonably. “But the crowd was pretty big and it was getting hot.”

Anduin held up the folded paper, waving it at them. “Indecent exposure,” he repeated. 

Hardwire snorted. “Not my fault that guardsman couldn’t tell the difference between my shorts and my fur.” He plucked at the hem of the garment in question which was, Anduin had to admit, very close in color to Hardwire’s dark brown fur. “Still had my belt on, what in hell did he think I was wearing?”

“Apparently just the belt,” Anduin replied dryly. He folded his arms, leaning one shoulder against the heavy wrought iron bars that covered the front of the cell. “Resistance to authority?”

“Oh, _always_ ,” Ren piped up, snorting a laugh. Hardwire grinned, broad and amused.

“That’s me we’re talking about, right? Not my fault he couldn’t take a joke. Told him if he didn’t believe me, he could grab my ass and make sure for himself.”

Shaw made a sound as though he were choking, muffling it hastily in his fist. Anduin hid his own smile behind the piece of paper, tapping it idly against his lips. “I think we can disregard the charges of resistance,” he said when he could trust his voice to be steady. “I know what you’re capable of, and there was no property damage or injury. The guards aren’t chosen for their senses of humor, but they should know better than to try to press charges for a bit of mouthing off.” Hardwire’s grin was all tooth. “Or swearing,” Anduin amended. “Or insults, no matter how loudly yelled.”

“There remains the question,” he continued dryly, ignoring how his mates were both unbearably smug, “of who instigated breaking and entering the Trade District auction house, after hours, and then invited a hundred more people than the building’s actual capacity to a drunken dance party that could be heard clear in the _Cathedral District._ ”

Ren just shrugged. “Like I said, party was already going when we got there,” Hardwire said. 

“It was a good party,” Ren added, earnestly. “And they already had kegs set up out in the square for the people watching the fireworks.”

“Be that as it may,” Shaw sighed, “do you have any idea who organized it?”

Hardwire shook his head, sitting back against the stone with his arms crossed. Ren tilted his head to his cousin, then rolled his eyes when Hardwire rumbled something indistinct in Pandaren. “So you can arrest them or recruit them?” he asked bluntly. 

“Mostly so we can figure out how they did it,” Anduin said truthfully. “Given the lack of property damage I’m disinclined to push it into the courts, but the guards get understandably nervous when they don’t know how something got past them.”

The cousins shared another glance and Hardwire relented, his posture softening. “The Worgen calling the dance sets was a mage,” he admitted. “She’d yell out the set and if you were part of it then suddenly you’d be up on the dais,” he snapped his fingers in emphasis, “like that. Lots of localized teleports.”

“Gnomes,” Ren added. “They had those music things, the ones with the songs recorded on scroll, set up. I’m not sure if all the colored lighting was Gnome or magic.”

“A sable furred female Worgen mage,” Anduin mused, “and Gnomes. Master Shaw?”

Shaw straightened. “Yes, Sire?”

“Check with the guards and see if anyone matching those descriptions ended up in the cells,” Anduin directed mildly. “Tell Captain Malendey to start processing the release of everyone picked up last night, unless there was violence involved. And you might want to pass on a message with regards to some further training in racial recognition for the human guards.”

“Like the difference between cloth and fur?” Shaw snorted. “Yes, sir.”

“Exactly,” Anduin agreed, letting himself grin in answer to his mates’ chuckles. He held out his hand to Shaw, palm up. “Keys, please.”

There was a moment of hesitation, just one heartbeat too long. Anduin slanted his glance sideways to catch the flicker of conflicted expression on the face of the head of SI:7. “…sir?”

“Keys,” Anduin clarified, smiling pleasantly. “The ones you lifted from the good Captain when we came in,” he clarified, and had to raise his voice over Ren’s startled bark of mirth and Hardwire’s deeper rolling laugh. “Because you couldn’t help yourself and I’m surrounded by thieves, reprobates, and drunks. Keys, please?”

Shaw looked rather like he’d been caught with his hand in a cookie jar, consternation and irritation chasing each other across his face before he settled on a grudging ghost of a smile and dug out a heavy ring of keys to drop into Anduin’s hand. “Good to see you’ve been keeping up your lessons, your Majesty.”

“Observation only,” Anduin demurred, grinning. “I couldn’t have lifted them. Tell the Captain I have them, and remind him he has a spare set, if you please.”

“Yes, sir,” Shaw confirmed smoothly. Anduin waited until the other man had disappeared around the bend in the corridor before he lifted the keys, flicking through them to find the correct one.

“That was cruel,” Ren said, still chuckling.

Anduin snorted. “That was revenge,” he corrected, “for waking me up pounding on the door like something was on fire. And if he’s going to perpetuate that ridiculous game of who can get the better of whom that SI:7 plays with the guard, he deserves to be called on it. Ah, here we are,” he finished, sliding one of the keys into the lock of the cell door. It turned smoothly, with only a muted metal thunk, and Anduin hummed a pleased sound; maintenance was one of his standing directives, of both the people and equipment that formed the backbone of Stormwind’s military. 

His mates climbed to their feet, brushing off straw. Anduin swung the door open and fumbled beneath his cloak, tugging free two lengths of cloth he had tucked into his belt. Quick motions bundled each one up, tossing them to their respective owner with an easy accuracy that caught his Consort full in the face. Hardwire manage to bring his hands up fast enough to catch his, grin flashing.

Ren pulled the bundle off of his ears and shook it out to reveal one of his own shirts. He snorted, amused. “No pants?”

“If you’re going to get me up at this hour to get you out of the Stockades,” Anduin said, grinning as he leaned against the open doorway, “then I think walking across the city in your shorts is a minor enough price to pay. Especially,” he added pointedly, “since you could have gotten out at any point. _Your Highness_.”

Ren snorted, pulling the shirt on over his head and tugging his braid free. “What, and spend two hours convincing them I really am the Royal Consort, only for them to send a runner to the castle to wake you up at an even worse hour to confirm it? Catching some sleep sounded like a better idea.”

“Dry,” Hardwire agreed, “and warmer than outside. And they keep the place fairly clean. I’ve slept in worse.” He grinned, tugging down the hem of the sleeveless tunic that barely came to his hips. “What would you have done if we really didn’t have our shorts on?”

“Enjoyed watching you walk back to the castle even more,” Anduin replied blandly without hesitation. He relented a moment later with a shake of his head, chuckling. “Or imposed on a mage for a portal, I suppose.” He glanced down the corridor but it was quiet, the occupants of the cells further down still either asleep or passed out - he had counted a number of Humans and Kel’dorei, neither of which had a Pandaren’s tolerance for the amount, or mixture, of alcohols that had been confiscated during the arrest. 

Stepping into the cell, he reached for Ren first, drawing his mate in for a kiss, then pulled Hardwire in for the same. “Did you have fun?”

Ren chuckled, slipping a hand around Anduin’s waist to pull him between them. Anduin sighed happily, closing his eyes and leaning into the familiar feel of being surrounded by their solidity and warmth. “It was a lot of fun,” Ren said, nuzzling Anduin’s hair. “Shame you weren’t with us.”

Hardwire rumbled an agreement, his touch light against Anduin’s face. “And you don’t have to come get us, cub, no matter what knots Shaw is tying himself in.”

“Of course I don’t have to,” Anduin agreed with a smile, opening his eyes to meet his mate’s. “But I always will.” He tilted his head up for another kiss, sinking his fingers into the tangled length of Hardwire’s hair and the shorter, smoother plush of Ren’s fur. Anduin laughed softly when they let him breathe, the ridiculousness of it all bubbling up to mix with love and humor, his grin turning upwards in a way that he rarely allowed himself. 

“So,” he drawled, teasing, “this was a fun first morning of the new year. Is this how the entire _rest_ of the year is going to go?”


End file.
